By Bob Topper:
A disturbing essay by conservative Republican Judge Michael J. Luttig, The Final Battle for American Democracy, lays out steps that Trump and his minions will likely take to overturn the results of the coming midterm election. The Trump gang will refuse to seat a duly elected Democrat majority.
This possibility should not be ignored. Desperate people do desperate things, and Trump is under intense pressure. Polls indicate that he, his party, and his policies are deeply unpopular and will be rejected in the midterms. Facing the loss of congressional control, they are likely to refuse to transfer power and try to justify that refusal by falsely claiming election fraud, repeating the violent, but failed, J6 attempt.
Trump has been preparing the way. During an October 1 rally in Oklahoma, he stated that Democrats are “cheaters,” and that undocumented immigrants will vote illegally. But with all of Trump’s bluster he has never produced a shred of evidence. And one must ask, are Democrats so ingenious that they can falsify millions of votes without leaving a trace? And why would an illegal, who was bright enough to get to America, be so foolish as to risk his stay by voting illegally? In fact, American elections are exceedingly fair and honest.
Donald Trump may earnestly believe that Democrats cheat. Liars and cheaters tend to believe everyone lies and cheats. With that belief they reconcile their own duplicity. The clinical term for this phenomenon is psychological projection, a form of cognitive dissonance. By convincing themselves that “everyone does it” they eliminate internal guilt and discomfort.
But not everyone does it. Our elections are trustworthy, and very few people are as duplicitous as Trump. According to the Washington Post, Donald Trump made 30,573 false or misleading claims during his first term.
In Trump’s solipsistic, delusional view, democracy stands in the way of his pursuit of unlimited power. He therefore works to undermine it by sowing doubt in our elections, which the Republican Party’s supports. Ironically, this is the Party that once championed democracy. Both Bush Administrations tried to spread democracy through the middle east and sacrificed thousands of American lives and spent trillions of dollars to that end.
Why are so many of our good people, fellow citizens, willing to give up their heritage of liberty, equality, and democracy for a fascist autocracy?
Capitalizing on Resentment
Over the past 50 years, American democracy has failed the middle class. Good-paying jobs moved offshore, wages stagnated, and between 1975 and 2020, fifty trillion dollars shifted from the bottom 90% to the top one percent. This growing inequality fueled resentment and discontent. Dislocated and discouraged many Americans turned to opioids to cope with their depression, while others eked out a living devoting more time to less fulfilling work. Rejection of the system that had failed them became widespread.
Three factions joined forces to capitalize on this resentment—Trump/MAGA, oligarchs, and Christian extremists. They use divide-and-conquer as their basic strategy.
Trump promised that he, and only he, could restore America to a former glory. He blamed people’s discontent on stupid politicians who had been outsmarted and out negotiated by foreign leaders. And he blamed job loss on illegal immigrants. His rhetoric appealed, though there was no evidence to support his allegations. In the end, President Trump’s promises were a con. His policies favored his family, the investor class, and corporations.
Trump also appealed to the religious right, promising to address their grievances, especially abortion rights, and he supported their efforts to stem the advance of humanism and to “make America pray again.” He appealed especially to the Christian Nationalists, about 32% of the nation, who gave him their undying support.
Some billionaire oligarchs also have a dim view of democracy. Elon Musk, Peter Theil, and his disciple JD Vance believe democracy is inefficient and obsolete. They envision a dystopian society in which a central executive authority will replace the will of the people with governance by an autocratic oligarchy of billionaire technocrats.
Having amassed enormous fortunes in our free, democratic society, one might expect they would be compelled to preserve it. Instead, they spend untold billions to undermine democracy. They backed Trump’s 2024 campaign, and Elon Musk alone has contributed $366 million to elect Republican candidates in the 2026 midterms.
People are better off in a democracy
Autocracies and oligarchies serve a wealthy few, not the people. They have repeatedly failed throughout history. And in our modern world a comparison of China, North Korea, and Russia to the liberal democracies, e.g., Finland, New Zealand, Uruguay, and Japan shows that people in democracies are happier, wealthier, and enjoy much greater freedom. Put simply, people are better off in a democracy. To convince people otherwise requires an expensive campaign of propaganda and disinformation, which wealthy technocrats willingly finance.
Ukraine illustrates the consequences of a compromised democracy. In 2014, Victor Yanukovych was ousted from Ukraine’s presidency. Like Donald Trump, he abused his office to accumulate excessive wealth. For his residence he built Mezhyhirya, a 340-acre estate located north of Kiev. The property contained a private golf course, a zoo, a full sports complex, and a helipad. The interior of his mansion was decked out with solid-gold toilet fixtures, crystal chandeliers, and expansive marble work. Today, it is a popular public park, the “Museum of Corruption.”
And, like Trump, Yanukovych was a president with autocratic ambitions. Under his regime, state corruption was extreme, political persecutions were commonplace, and the economy stagnated. The people suffered, just as the American people are suffering under the MAGA administration.
The Ukrainians ousted Yanukovych, but their struggle for freedom continued. Putin could not abide a prosperous, free, and democratic nation on his border, especially a former member of the Soviet Union. The Russian people might question their allegiance to Putin’s repressive regime.
To eliminate the threat, Putin ordered the Russian army to invade Ukraine. He expected a brief “special military operation,” after which he would restore Yanukovych to power.
But the Ukrainian people would have none of it. Memories of life under Yanukovych were still fresh. Putin’s special military operation turned into a four-year war with no end in sight. The Ukrainian people want peace but would rather suffer the hardships of war than live under a corrupt and oppressive autocratic regime.
Ukrainians fight to preserve their liberty and democracy. Americans who support Trump’s autocratic ambitions should appreciate that the Ukrainian people are fighting for the very principles that inspired American patriots in 1776.
Yet Trump and his administration have shamefully sided with Russia, a nation waging war against America’s founding principles. By waiving sanctions on Russia, Trump effectively helps finance Putin’s war—even as Putin supports Iran’s war against the United States. Donald the deal maker broke a sacred bond with our allies, which had brought 80 years of peace to much of the western world.
This raises troubling questions: Is Trump the Manchurian candidate or is he simply Putin’s useful idiot?
American democracy has serious flaws, but giving up is not the answer. We must reclaim it from the wealthy and other special interests that have corrupted it.
On November 3, vote the MAGA quislings out of office and prepare for what Judge Luttig calls democracy’s final battle.
Bob Topper, syndicated by PeaceVoice, is a retired engineer.